DTO

I could not disagree more with the first statement. Anything that is pre-existing and even potentially impactful to the marriage needs to be made known. That includes health issues.

Was the OP's wife suffering from a health issue? Absolutely yes! She had suffered an emotionally / mentally damaging event that certainly can (and in fact did) seriously harm her ability to meet her marital responsibility. (I know this is a controversial position).

She committed a lie of omission. She knows what is expected of marriage, knew (or should have known) that her ability to meet that was questionable, and still married him. She should have told about this out of respect and integrity. Honest people do not promisewhat they cannot provide - it really is that simple.

You ironically point out the error in your argument. Yes she can get therapy to overcome her issues and / or she can just push through her discomfort. The problem is that many women are not willing to do either. In this case, it was 20+ years and likely because he refused to accept a bad sex life.

Many times people do not (or cannot, depending on your point of view) work to overcome these issues. They simply expect their partners to accomodate them, or they walk away. That is why prior disclosure is a must.

Thor

My experience is the opposite. We went into a honeymoon phase after she decided to try. (recap: After I approached her wanting marriage counseling it took her 12 days to start wearing her wedding rings again). Then it was a slow decline. This is a real re-run of our relationship from the beginning. Lots of great uninhibited sex at first, then she started having significant emotional difficulties with sex as things got serious. Now we're back to nearly no sex and she is distracted and pulled away emotionally all the time.


I think there is a lot to that, but it goes a lot deeper. I was willing to blame myself because she seemed so normal and free spirited when we were dating. So it must have been my fault that she was having such difficulties with sexual and emotional intimacy.

I don't think she had any idea early in our marriage that her problems were related to her CSA. My counselor told me that she herself did not realize that her dissociation during sex in her marriage was at all related to her CSA. She thought it was normal for a married woman to have those kinds of feelings and problems, and that they were due to relationship issues. With time she realized how abnormal their sex life was. With therapy she realized how much her CSA was influencing her even when she did not consciously think of the CSA.

My wife knew that her CSA was a problem later when she was in a period of active nightmares and flashbacks. She also avoided marriage therapy at that time when I was pushing for it. At times she obviously knew that her CSA was negatively impacting me, yet she rationalized it somehow as ok.

Thor

The first part I agree with.

The second part I agree with also, but it isn't that simple. In my wife's case and in others that I am familiar with, she learned at an early age that it was safe and better to conceal the abuse. Perhaps a parent or teacher disbelieved her story. Perhaps she was ridiculed and blamed for the abuse. Whatever it was, she learned that it was good to lie about it.

The young child grows up but does not unlearn this lesson. My wife carried this into the marriage, and in fact generalized the lesson into believing that secrecy and lies in a marriage are morally acceptable if they protect somebody.

Yes she knew what the words were that were coming out of her mouth when she said the marriage vows, but they meant something very different to her than to me or anyone else in the church that day. I don't believe she had any idea that her interpretation or belief system was atypical.

DTO

I know this is an older thread, but - seriously? Maybe we differ on how much disruption inflicted on another person's life is okay.

The OP's wife is indeed allowed to be hurt about what happens to her, but she is not allowed to inflict that hurt on her husband and make him an unwilling co-victim. That is where the line should be drawn.

The OP's wife, rather than get help for her issues, chose to get married in an unhealthy state. Her husband paid for this with 23 years (at least) of a bad sex life and probably many more years before she gets herself healthy (if ever). In other cases, either the victim or the spouse ends the marriage because the victim simply is unable to get it together and provide sexually, leaving behind devastated children, wasted years, etc.

Now, is anybody "destroyed" here? Not in the strictest sense of the word, but there will be a legacy of pain and baggage to overcome. I really do sympathize with the victims, but there is no benefit they can obtain for being married that is worth the pain they will inflict to others coming into a situation unhealthy.

Thor

Iwant2bhappy, best of luck to you.

Please keep in mind that your husband also contributed equally to the problems in your marriage. You are not solely responsible for either the good or the bad in your marriage.

I hope you find peace soon.

DTO

Actually, it's quite simple. If I get married to someone who cannot meet her sexual responsibility, I have two bad choices:

1) Walk out and find someone else.
2) Stick around and hope that she finds the courage to get help and that some day the sex life will be at least adequate.

I guess it depends on your perspective. If you are a low drive person and don't think sex is important, you aren't going to see a bad sex life as a sacrifice and aren't going to feel that the sposue has been victimized to a meaningful degree.

And even this assumes that the fallout of the abuse hasn't trickled down to non-sexual parts of the marriage (as in the victim does not harbor general resentment towards the opposite gender and can parent effectively).

SimplyAmorous

I have not read all of these replies on here, but my heart goes out to the original poster JustAMan 2, I feel you are an amazing man for sticking it out all of these years as you have done.... I can not even begin to imagine how difficult this must have been on you ..... I don't feel I could have done it -had I been in such shoes, even for a very short period of time.... I am with every poster on here who believes these things should be discussed before marriage..... when you marry someone, and commit your life to them, 2 are joined to be ONE , their issues become YOUR issues. You had a right to know.....so help could be had earlier on and avoided all the pain that led up to now.

I am of the belief .... burying our issues is never never never helpful in this life.

I see you both as victims here.


Sawney Beane put this link in your 1st reply.. Married Man Sex Life: Skeletons In The Sexual History Closet

on this issue .....

__________________
"Love Good Blog"

Enchantment

We can pontificate all we want that people should fully disclose all there is to know about themselves, good or bad, prior to marriage.

However, the reality is that someone who has been abused, sexual or otherwise, especially as a child, will have much greater chances of not growing and developing in an emotionally healthy way whereby they would simply not be able to disclose this information. They may not even realize until a very long time later what a tremendous impact their abuse may have in shaping their lives and relationships.

Therefore, I think it is a waste of precious time and resource to blame the abused for not being able to live up to some supposed obligation to disclose. Accept that they often could not disclose at the point you got married. Accept that they could not until a point in time that they were ready to face it.

Instead, employ your powers of empathy and compassion in the here and now to help support your spouse to overcome their demons, and well and truly let your regrets and hurts go about the past in much the same way the abused must. Otherwise, the both of you will not be able to move forward. Forgive your abused spouse for not being able to tell you in times past and move forward.

Wishing you all the best.

__________________

Enter these enchanted woods, You who dare. ~ George Meredith

faithnhope

I have to agree. Those who survive abuse often times don't know how to deal with it for several years. I am a survivor myself and have also did counseling with others. It is usually when a survivor feels safe and at peace that repressed issues surface. Its defense mechanisms 101. It is tragic for the survivor and for the partner but when you blame a survivor for not divulging his/her history, you are saying that him/her didn't handle their trauma the way you think they should have. Most abuse is about power and control so it is relatively easy to assume that most survivors will have difficulty with issues related to power/control. Sex is one of those issues.
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DTO

Absolutely I do. I was a co-victim / "secondary survivor" / whatever label for the entire 16 years of my marriage. As I have noted elsewhere, my admitted some issues prior to marriage but downplayed their severity and falsely promised that she would be able to provide for me sexually.

Turns out she was just doing the minimum to keep me, promised better, and instead things got worse from the get-go. She did not consider that she would have to work hard to overcome it. She eventually admitted she never had the desire but assumed things would change after marriage and noted that fixing her issues was not worth the effort.

So how did the marriage go? When the desire did not emerge, she decided early on that she would deny and then blame-shift - anything as long as she did not have to honor her commitment or suffer any consequences from her failure to do so. It was not until I pressed the issue that the truth came out. Besides that, it was basically occasional pity sex (1x month avg) with occasional periods of long-term refusal.

I know how it goes. I've read up (much of it on boards like this). From what I've read spouses rarely do a 180 and get completely healthy. Many attempt to get help and find it too hard. Many tolerate their dysfunction and avoid sexual situations. And some are angry their spouses will not accept a bad sex life. My ex was ok being inadequate but resented my desire. She did not care that me just "accepting it" was solving the wrong problem.

I don't get why you're opposed to what I said. We both agree that this should be disclosed prior to marriage. You are fairly lucky your wife admitted the truth and seemingly is trying to do better. Maybe our different outcomes impact our perspectives.

DTO

Disagree. Personally, I did not have an issue with how my wife handled her abuse. What I did have issue with was her coming into the marriage knowing she could not meet the basic needs.

That is exactly my point. It's fairly forseeable that survivors will have sex issues. It might seem cynical, but I think an earlier poster had it right: abuse victims know they are likely to be seen as less desireable. I would go further and say the greater the distress, the more likely the victim will hide the abuse.

DTO

I really agree with this.

I would add that I was not put out so much by the failure to tell me per se. It is more the fact that she knew she had not overcome it, and would not bother to fix it, that was the real problem.

Later on, I came to understand that it's understood most abuse survivors have these sorts of issues. If it such common knowledge, I have a hard time believing that the abuse survivors themselves don't believe it to be a problem. That is where I came to believe that full disclosure is essential.

DTO

Agree. Likewise, I existed as a way for my ex to have a home and a good father for the kids she wanted. One of her friends tried to tell me indirectly, as in "what do you think of this friend I have - she does not like sex and got married to have kids".

DTO

Gotcha. I think I got part of your post confused with someone elses.

I do truly sympathize with what you endured in the past.

JustAMan2

Hey everybody, it's me, the OP.

To be clear, I want to say again that I realize that sometimes CSA victims have REPRESSED memories. They honestly don't know why they act the way they do. It isn't until the memories are "triggered" and come flooding back that the pieces begin to fall into place for the victim.

This was NOT the case with my wife, and several others however.

My wife, after telling me of what she endured as a little girl, confessed that she KNEW ALL ALONG (for 23 years of marriage) that the problems in our marriage--I speak here of the sexual ones--but there were others related to her CSA too--MOSTLY came from her side of the bed.

I realize that I brought my own "junk" to the bed too--we all do.

The difference was that I sat my bride-to-be down ahead of time and offered to share with her my complete sexual past. She said she "didn't want to hear it" (that was a red flag that I didn't pick up on).

I want to say again that my PURPOSE in starting this thread was and still is: IF I can get one CSA victim who has not told their spouse WHY they are rejecting them or engaging in other unacceptable behaviors in their marriage...if by reading about what it's like to be in my shoes, or those of Thor or other secondary survivors...if that causes JUST one survivor to open up, start healing and move forward...then MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!!!

CSA survivors are deeply, deeply wounded and I don't want to minimize that in any way.

BUT...so are their spouses!!! It's time to end the cycle. It's time to speak up. It's time to heal.

My wife told me that when we were dating she fell really, really hard for me. She said that she honestly thought that because of her deep feelings of love for me that all the "junk" was behind her.

I believe she genuinely felt that way. Who wouldn't want to put that "junk" behind them and move forward in a committed, loving marriage?

But it wasn't long (the honeymoon, actually!!!) until it became evident to her (I was clueless as to WHY but I knew SOMETHING was wrong) that she had not "moved on". She had the keys the whole time.

So, as I experienced rejection after rejection after rejection, as I searched for answers but got none, as I asked her questions, as I faced accusation after accusation that I was a pervert and there was something "wrong" with me...

What I'm saying is that with all that history in our marriage (and other things too) it's not as simple as just all of the sudden having the REAL truth and then turning off a light switch on all those feelings of rejection etc. that I experienced for 23 years.

Just like her, I now have some serious scars. I'm not equating my scars to hers, but none-the-less...

SO...my main theme again is:

To CSA victims out there who have not yet told someone and sought healing: Stop putting yourself through this!! Stop putting your mate and your friends and your family through this!! You CAN and WILL be better. The answer lies not in covering it up or pretending it's all OK, the answer lies in getting it out and dealing with it in a healthy and productive way. Difficult??? Oh, yes, I won't lie to you here!!! Yes...very difficult!! Worth it??? YES!!!! SO worth it!!!

IF you are blessed with a mate that stayed with you in spite of you not speaking up, you can almost be assured they will stay, be your ally and help you heal, but they DO deserve a REAL mate. And YOU, as a victim, deserve to move on with your life as well.

My wife AVOIDED dealing with this problem for YEARS. It has been at TREMENDOUS cost to her, to me and to our marriage, just for starters.